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Luana Patten Profile
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| (Luana J. Patten) |
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| 6 July 38 | is born in Long Beach, California. Her mother’s maiden name is Miller. |
| c. mid-40s | moves with her family from Cedar Rapids to Los Angeles |
| 46 | is chosen from 5,000 applicants for a leading part in Disney's Song of the South |
| January 49 | she and fellow child actor Bobby Driscoll accompany Walt Disney to Indianapolis and, subsequently, to Columbus and Cincinnati to promote their upcoming So Dear to My Heart. In Indianapolis, RKO throws a party in the Chateau Room of the Claypool Hotel. The children are in custody of their mothers and when not working or on tour, they keep up with their lessons with the help of a private tutor assigned by the Los Angeles public school system. For three hours each day, they must study and recite their English, geography and arithmetic lessons to Victor Griffith, who has been teaching at the studios for 14 years. |
| ? | for five years she goes to school on the Disney lot |
| c. 52 | leaves her film career at age 14 and returns to school |
| 26 September 52 | her sister, Marcy Linn, is born in Los Angeles |
| c. 56 | marries Ronald Dale Huntley. He’s about 22; she’s about 18. |
| June 56 | graduates from Woodrow Wilson High School in Long Beach and notifies her agent she is ready to work. Within a matter of days, she's signed to star in Rock, Pretty Baby at Universal-International and Johnny Tremaine at Disney's. |
| December 56 | says about Elvis Presley: "He can't sing and he has too much hair. I don't get his message." |
| January 57 | columnist Erskine Johnson reports that she's headed for stardom at Universal-International |
| she and Johnny Anderson are reported a new twosome at the Encore Room |
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| May 57 | turns down the part Sandra Dee eventually wins in Teach Me How to Cry because she doesn't think the role is "big enough" for her |
| July 57 | her four-year-old sister, Marcy Lynn Patten, poses with her and co-star Jock Mahoney on the set of Joe Dakota |
| 58 | occasionally double-dates with young actor John Saxon. She is the victim of an unhappy schoolgirl elopement at 16 and is concentrating on an annulment. |
| August 58 | replaces Connie Stevens in The Young Captives |
| January 59 | columnist Harrison Carroll reports that "it's date after date already for her and John Smith, who met filming a 'Cimarron City' TV segment" |
| tests to play the oldest daughter of Clifton Webb and Gene Tierney in Holiday for Lovers |
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| c. February 59 | divorces Huntley. Huntley is a good friend of John Smith and helps sign papers so that Luana and Smith can get married in church. |
| May 59 | columnist Hedda Hopper expects her soon to announce her engagement to John Smith. "She returned from location of Home from the Hill but couldn't go home; her 6-year-old sister had measles." |
| December 59 | she and Smith announce their engagement in Hollywood. He's 28; she's 21. He began his career as a mail room boy at MGM. |
| January 60 | she, her fiancé John Smith, George Peppard, and George Hamilton fly to San Francisco for a sneak preview of Home from the Hill |
| February 60 | columnist Harrison Carroll reports that she and Smith will marry on her birthday, July 6. “She just finished Home from the Hill and will go into Go Naked in the World next." |
| March 60 | Carroll tells that when the actors' strike drags on, she and Smith are apt to make that altar trek when John's "Laramie" TV series starts its annual hiatus April 6 |
| April 60 | attends the Academy Awards party at the Beverly Hilton with Smith and says they will be married as soon as the Catholic Church gives permission. "We want to have a nuptial mass," she says. "I am about three-quarters through my instructions. It won't be too long now." |
| 31 May 60 | takes out a marriage license in Los Angeles to wed actor John Smith |
| 4 / 5 June 60 | marries Smith in a Roman Catholic ceremony. He's 29; she's 22. It's her second marriage and his first. |
| July 60 | she and Smith tour the States in a station wagon on their honeymoon. They visit relatives in Kansas City, Missouri, and Enid, Oklahoma. |
| ? | she and Smith settle in a hilltop home, near the estates of Errol Flynn and Dan Durya |
| 25 July 61 | columnist Hedda Hopper reports that Luana will get the feminine lead in MGM's upcoming Brothers Grimm. "She plays Greta Heinrich, Karl Boehm's wife, and begins work next week. There'll be some European locations before work resumes at the studio. Luana, dyed blonde for the part, has been warned to stay out of the swimming pool for the duration." |
| August 61 | Hopper reports her bowing out of her seven-year contract with MGM and out of Brothers Grimm. “Since locations take me to Munich, Germany, and elsewhere - and I am happily married and very much in love with my husband John Smith, I do not want to make any movies that will take me away longer than two weeks - that was our pact,” she tells. |
| December 61 | she and Smith will fly to Japan in January. “John’s TV series, ‘Laramie,’ is very big over there...” |
| August 63 | she, her husband and fellow TV actor Don Collier attend a benefit dance at the Valley Garden Ballroom in North Hollywood, from which proceeds will go to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society |
| June 64 | columnist Hedda Hopper reports that Luana and John Smith are to star in the upcoming Texas Pistol |
| 30 August 64 | she and Smith separate |
| 3 December 64 | divorces Smith in Los Angeles testifying that “he seemed to have a habit of saying he was going away for the weekend and then wouldn’t show up until 20 or 21 days later.” He’s 32; she’s 26. He doesn’t contest the divorce. Under property settlement terms she gets a home in Sun Valley, $18,000 by April 1965 and $500 a month alimony for three years. |
| 26 June 70 | marries Jerry D. Mays in Los Angeles. He's 27; she's 31. |
| December 73 | divorces Mays in Los Angeles |
| ? | resides in Long Beach, California |
| 1 May 96 | as Luana J. Patten, she dies at age 57 in Long Beach, California, from respiratory failure |
| February 11 | her former husband Raymond D. Huntley remembers her “a great gal” |
| Sources: Raymond D. Huntley, Whatever became of...? #11 by Richard Lamparski, The Zanesville Signal, The Lima News, The Berkshire Eagle, Syracuse Herald-Journal, The Vidette-Messenger, The Daily Gleaner, Tri-City Herald, Lancaster Eagle-Gazette, Van Nuys News, Dell's Who's Who on the Screen, Screen Stories, Silver Screen, www.IMDb.com, www.Ancestry.com | |
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| Links: Filmography Find A Grave | |